


All Persons Fictitious

by coraxes



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Manhandling, Post-Dragon Age: Inquisition, Pre-Dragon Age: Inquisition - Trespasser DLC, Varric Tethras’s Shitty Romance Serials, author is bisexual and really into cassandra and varric's muscles, side adoribull
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-06
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-02-26 23:44:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18727279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coraxes/pseuds/coraxes
Summary: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.Cassandra didn't get the memo.





	1. Chapter 1

“Ah, _shit—_ ”

Cassandra pushed to her feet with a grunt, the weight of her arm suddenly too heavy for her shoulder. She grit her teeth and dropped her shield, half an eye on the Iron Bull. Of course he’d noticed her injury as soon as he caused it. He had already lowered his maul and was stepping closer.

“Alright there? Let me take a look,” he asked, face suddenly serious. Cassandra disliked that. Bull never minded giving—or getting—a few bruises or lacerations in their little practice matches, and if he’d dropped his usual good cheer it meant that she really must look bad.

Still, she nodded tightly. Dislocation _was_ a serious injury. She recognized the sharp _pop_ when Bull’s last ringing blow had caught her shield, felt the stretching pain behind and below her socket now that the initial numb shock had faded. “Don’t think this means you won,” she warned him, trying to grin. Her cheeks felt stretched too tight.

“Pretty sure it does.” One of Bull’s big hands settled behind her shoulder, the other on her arm just above her elbow. His fingers traced along a lump of bone on her back that definitely should not have been there. Cassandra blinked slowly, forcing herself to relax even as pain shot along her nerves. She raised her free arm and tapped her blade against Bull’s ribs; he let out a rumbling laugh. “Now that’s just—”

His hand tightened on her arm, pulled back as he pushed the bone. _Pop_ went her shoulder, _again._

“ _Shit!_ ”

“—cheating,” Bull said, and smirked.

“ _That_ was cheating,” snapped Cassandra. But in truth she had to admire his trick, and his practicality about the whole situation—so when she smacked him with the flat of her blade it wasn’t enough to hurt. Cassandra rolled her shoulder and grimaced as the whole joint protested, pain lancing into her collarbone and back. Obviously she still needed to see a healer. “But thank you.”

Bull shrugged. “My fault anyway. Get yourself healed and come back for revenge tomorrow.” His eye glinted and his mouth curled into a familiar suggestive grin. “I’d be happy to take whatever punishment you can think of.”

“I’m sure,” Cassandra said, shaking her head to hide her grin. She sheathed her sword and picked up her shield with her uninjured arm; then she marched off to the healers’ wing.

Unfortunately, after much tutting, the healers couldn’t condone her revenge. While the actual damage was healed with a few moments’ worth of spells, the muscle and tendons and ligaments in her shoulder were still weakened and apparently likely to be permanently injured if she didn’t take proper care of the area. The healers gave her strict instructions not to spar or train with weapons for a few weeks, _especially_ with the Iron Bull, and wrote a list of strengthening exercises to do in the meantime.

Cassandra left the wing much less sore but much more irritated than she had entered it.

Adaar, Sera, Cole, and Blackwall—Rainier—had left for the Deep Roads two weeks ago. Rainier because he intended to join the wardens afterward, Cole because he could not contract the Blight, Sera because she refused to let her lover venture into the Deep Roads alone, and Adaar because—frankly, Cassandra didn’t know why. Probably she was just curious. With Corypheus dead the inquisition had much less to do, and so Cassandra had much less to do as well. Her research into the Seekers of Truth and a cure for tranquility had stalled out; she had already read most of the interesting books in the library, and was seriously considering learning Tevene just to expand her potential material.

“What’s wrong, Seeker? You look like you just discovered nug hands.”

Cassandra stopped in her tracks and blinked at Varric across the corridor. Ink stained his fingers and swiped over his nose; he had probably been writing. Maker knew there was little else for him to do at the moment. “Nugs don’t have hands.”

Varric shook his head. Faux-wistfulness crossed his face. “Would that I were so innocent.” His affect was insincere, but _nug hands_? Cassandra couldn’t tell if he was bullshitting her. She decided to ignore it and ask Leliana later. “Looked like Tiny hit you pretty hard. You alright?”

Varric’s bedroom window overlooked her usual training ground; she hadn’t expected him to actually watch. Cassandra popped her knuckles self-consciously and Varric shot them a nervous look. Why did she care if he watched her train? She often attracted an audience, after all. “I have been ordered to keep from sparring until my shoulder has had time to recover,” she said.

“So how long until you’re climbing the walls?”

Despite herself, Cassandra snorted; a smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. Varric’s expression softened into something a bit less affected. He always got full of himself when he made Cassandra smile. Not that she could really blame him. For the first year of their acquaintance, she would have thought it impossible.

But that still faded, and Varric scratched his jaw, leaving more faint trails of ink. “If you need something to do, I’ve been working on a new romance serial. Could use another pair of eyes.”

“You’d let me read a draft?” Cassandra asked, too quick, and snapped her mouth shut. Since the inquisitor had left, Cassandra had already read through his books yet another time. She missed reading something _new._

“Anything for my biggest fan.” Varric grinned and puffed out his nearly-bare chest. Not for the first time Cassandra felt the urge to tug his collar shut. It was _distracting,_ and he knew it. “It might never see the light of day, but I think you’ll like it.”

“You think my taste is that bad?” Cassandra drawled, but followed as Varric turned back the way he had come.

“Nah, it’s just an exercise. I’m stuck on another project and thought I’d clear my head with something new.”

The strategy was familiar to her even if its application was not. “What is the other project?”

Varric waved his arms in an all-encompassing gesture. “This. The story of the inquisition. Hard to put some of this shit into words, though, because not all of it makes sense. Why was Corypheus at the Conclave? What did he sacrifice the Divine for?”

Cassandra frowned, thrown by the question. She had made her peace with Most Holy’s fate, tried to carry out her legacy, but— “I assumed she was symbolic. Corypheus claimed to have found the Maker’s throne empty; perhaps he wished to attack the Maker’s symbol among the living world.”

“Eh, maybe. Seems like a weird way to go about it, though,” said Varric. He reached for his door, but Cassandra’s arms were longer and she pushed it open over his head. Varric shot her a long-suffering look as they entered his room.

She had never been there before. His desk caught the eye first. It faced the door from the opposite wall, but he had piled books and bound stacks of paper so high on it that he may as well have been sequestered. More books were stacked up in columns around it. Varric dodged them as easily as if they were part of the furniture. Past the desk was the bed, shoved off into a corner; it was human-sized, and Varric had made the most of this by stacking more books at the foot. The overall impression was less “bedroom” and more “office in which someone had forgotten a bed.”

Varric grabbed a sheaf of paper from the desk. Two more pages had been spread out to dry; he tested the ink on them and added them to the bottom of the stack, then handed that out to Cassandra. “Here. I started it _in media res_ because I couldn’t be assed to write a lead-in, so let me know if you need more information for it to make sense.”

Cassandra flipped through the pages. Several words were smudged; more were crossed out and written over. In particular she saw that _the elf_ and _the dwarf_ had been scribbled through a few times, replaced respectively with _Vidas_ and _Thaun,_ as if he hadn’t chosen their names until several pages in. “Did you write all of this today?” Cassandra asked.

“Yeah. I know you like my worst writing, Seeker, but this really might just be nonsense,” Varric said with a shrug.

Nonsense or not, Varric wouldn’t offer this lightly. She couldn’t unduly complain. Unless, of course, this turned out to be an elaborate joke—she wasn’t sure how, but wouldn’t put it past him. “Still, thank you.”

His answering smile was oddly sincere. Cassandra was more used to his smirks, but she felt herself relaxing at the genuine smile. He still liked to act as if nothing truly mattered to him, and _she_ liked reassurances that that wasn’t the case. “Tell me what you think,” he said, and Cassandra waved her acknowledgment as she left for the library.

* * *

…Vidas’s blade was so sharp he’d cut himself if he looked at it for much longer, so he moved on to polishing, looking for miniscule flaws—anything to keep him from looking his (likely former, after that spectacular failure) employer in the eye.

 ~~“What the shi~~ “They were after you?” Thaun asked. His deep voice was level. Vidas would have preferred him to shout. The quiet sent a shiver down his spine. Obolus had always gone quiet before a punishment.

“Maybe. Could be either of us.” Vidas tried to sound more sure than he was. True, the coterie was a new enemy for Vidas, but their attackers had gone for him first. They had slaughtered Thaun’s caravan without mercy, but the ones who noticed they were fighting Vidas tried to hold back. Why else unless they were trying to take him alive? He shook his head. He should never have tried mercenary work. What was the point of being paid to protect someone if you just dragged them into your own mess? _(too much? Clean up)_ “But…I think they were there for me.”

“Okay.” Vidas heard no sound as Thaun rose; the man was preternaturally silent. But he saw him move from the corner of his eye. He glanced up to see the dwarf uncomfortably close. A hand landed on his wrist and squeezed. Thaun’s handsome face twisted into a determined scowl. “Then you know who sent them.”

“I do.”

* * *

A love story between two men, then? Cassandra would not have expected it from Varric, but supposed he wanted try something new. She was more surprised at his use of a dwarf as a love interest. Or perhaps a second main character, as one short section had been written in Thaun’s perspective. Varric never wrote major dwarf characters; he rarely wrote dwarves at all outside of his nonfiction. She wasn’t sure why. He certainly enjoyed telling stories about badly-behaved deshyrs.

The beginning felt formulaic but entertaining. Despite Varric’s caution Cassandra found it easy enough to follow. Vidas had been hired to protect Thaun and his brother’s merchant caravan on a trek through the Free Marches. The coterie had attacked and killed the brother along with other members of the caravan before Vidas finished them off. The two decided to band together to revenge themselves on their perpetrators, who were somehow connected to Vidas’s past—Varric hadn’t let on how yet. And there was a bit of attraction between them, though not as much as Cassandra was used to in Varric’s writing.

That feeling continued over the next several days as she and Varric exchanged drafts. She would return them with comments in the margins and he would give her new scenes to read—sometimes full chapters, sometimes only a handful of pages. Finally she asked him about it over breakfast, while returning his latest scene: Thaun and Vidas’s first kiss, absent any real context.

“Ah, I always add in the romantic shit later,” he said, rolling the papers up and tucking them into his belt. “I do the big beats in the first draft, but the subtler pining crap isn’t my style.”

Cassandra slammed her hands down on the table, ignoring Dorian’s noise of protest. “But the slow build is the best part! That was what I loved about the romance in _Swords & Shields_—the guardsman obviously pines after the knight-captain; the _reader_ notices his looks and touches, even when she gives them no significance.”

“I’m not saying it isn’t _good,_ Seeker. Just doesn’t feel natural when I’m writing.” Varric reached across the table and laid his hand over hers. It was overheated from where he had been clutching his mug of tea. “Awkward, see? You’ve got to be in the moment.”

Cassandra’s face warmed. The callous on Varric’s thumb scraped across the back of her hand, one absentminded stroke. “I’m trying to eat,” she said, and pulled her hand away.

Next to her Dorian mumbled into his porridge. Cassandra was pretty sure he said, “Maker’s balls,” but she didn’t glare at him. She was too busy determining whether Varric was actually blushing or just dyed pink by sunlight and stained glass.

After a moment she realized she was staring. She cleared her throat, smeared jam on her toast, and tried to remember what else she had meant to say. “You should write more women, as well,” she said finally. “All the characters mentioned so far have been men.”

“Have they? Shit.” Varric speared a piece of egg. “I’ve got a woman coming up with a pretty major part, but I’ll mess with the background characters when I rewrite, too.”

“See that you do,” said Cassandra primly. The back of her hand felt oddly sensitive, and she stretched out her fingers, trying to banish the ghost of that last touch.

* * *

“You know how much that pretty head of yours is going for?” asked Monty, sliding neatly onto the booth beside Thaun without so much as a by-your-leave. She swatted away the dagger Thaun drew and leaned across the table to steal Vidas’s roll. “Really, dear, I’d have thought you knew to be more cautious.”

Vidas adjusted. He’d had a lot of practice adjusting to Monty; she blew into and out of his life like a storm, and he could only brace himself, as he’d done since they first met. “Thaun, this is Montserrat Sevilla. She’s an…acquaintance.”

She shot him a droll look and propped her chin on her fist. “Ouch. And after I came all this way to warn you.”

Some years ago, a wealthy Antivan family had found that their thirteen-year-old daughter and heir also happened to be a mage. Sending her to the Circle was one possibility. The fathers’ trading partners in Tevinter were another. So at fifteen, Monty sailed across the Waking Sea to marry a man over a decade her senior. She and Vidas had met there, and when she left, Vidas had been at her side instead.

“And you just happened to track us down in some shit Marcher backwater?” Thaun snapped.

Monty nodded to the bracelet around her wrist, and the small glass vial full of red liquid attached to it. The end pointed at Vidas across the table, pulling Monty’s bracelet out of place. She murmured a word and the chain went slack.

“What do you need to warn me about?” Vidas asked, ignoring Thaun’s concerned look. Explaining Monty was always difficult, even when she wasn’t showing off her claim on him. Her casual use of blood magic didn’t bother him anymore; he trusted Monty with his life. Just not with his heart. _(good line but too much here)_ “I already know he’s found me again.”

“Ah.” Monty leaned forward, eyes alight. “But did you know it’s not just my dear husband you’re dealing with?”

* * *

Cassandra put the draft down, frowning. It wasn’t that she disliked the new additions; of course she enjoyed them, though she did wish they were heavier on the romance. That was why she read romance serials, after all. Well, that and the women. She had liked _Swords & Shields _as much for the Knight-Captain as the smut. It was a bit disappointing that both the protagonists were men for that reason, but Montserrat was…interesting. Cassandra could tolerate a blood mage in fiction, or at least in Varric’s.

The problem was that certain elements were beginning to seem familiar.

A taciturn elf with a large sword, fleeing his old master (employer? She wasn’t sure if Vidas had been a slave or a servant), bound up with a capricious but loyal apostate woman? Not to mention Thaun, Varric’s lone dwarf protagonist, a wealthy surfacer with a dead brother. She had read the _Tale of the Champion_ several times, after all.

Cassandra set the papers down and laughed to herself. She was drawing connections that weren’t there. Thaun had no crossbow or inconvenient first love; Vidas was a mercenary, and far less prone to drunkenness than what she remembered of Fenris. Besides, Fenris had fallen in love with the Champion—or perhaps Isabela? Or perhaps Isabela had fallen in love with Hawke. Cassandra knew they had all been together at some point in Kirkwall, and traveled together now, but Varric had been frustratingly vague about their actual relationship.

(“I’m not writing a gossip rag, Seeker,” he had told her during her third re-read as they crossed the Waking Sea to the Conclave. _Then what was that scene with Isabela and the_ knives, she had wondered. _What do you call Hawke pushing them both up against the wall?_ But if she had asked, Varric would tease her, so she hadn’t.)

It was no matter. Clearly Cassandra was more bored than she thought, if she was trying to connect one of Varric’s admittedly trashy romance serials to his own life. Soon she would be able to return to training, at least, and have something else to do besides read and speculate. In the meantime, she scribbled a few comments in the margins for when she got the draft back to Varric.

* * *

Cassandra did not walk from the healer’s wing with a spring in her step, because if she did half of Skyhold would tease her for letting on she was actually happy. Maker forbid that. She didn’t mind showing her emotions, but people always seemed so shocked to find she had them. But she perhaps walked faster than usual toward her usual place in the courtyard, already running through the exercises she wanted to try. It had been two weeks since she had dislocated her shoulder. The healer had originally said it would take her six to recover, but the healer hadn’t worked on many Seekers.

“What’s the rush?” Varric called after her. Cassandra gave an acknowledging wave and slowed a bit so he could catch up.

“I have been cleared for duty,” she said, unable to keep the smile from her voice. She stopped herself from taking the steps down to the courtyard two at a time. Varric walked quickly, but she knew he couldn’t manage _that._

She barely caught his look. Almost sly, but she couldn’t quite place it. “Ah. Does that mean your editing days are done?”

“I hope not,” she said too quickly, bit her lip, and added, “I can hardly train every hour of every day.”

“Sure about that?” Varric mumbled. Cassandra ignored this. He kept pace with her until they reached her usual setup with the dummies. She didn’t know why but supposed he just wanted to spectate, until he said outright: “You sure you can handle this, Seeker? We don’t need you to hurt yourself again.”

Cassandra’s steps halted. She turned to Varric and blinked, very slowly. Varric lifted an eyebrow back. She knew he was no coward, but something like fear glinted in his eyes; she half expected him to bolt for cover as was his wont in a battle. Then Cassandra turned, grabbed both sides of his open collar in her fist, and lifted Varric into the air.

He was not a _light_ man. She had seen the muscles in his arms, so she already knew this, but it still surprised her to hear the seams of his shirt protest along with the rest of him. “Whoa whoa Seeker _what—”_ He seized her forearm in both hands just as Cassandra was beginning to worry she’d only rip his shirt off. Maker, he’d never let it go.

Instead, she finished lifting Varric to her eye level and allowed herself a smirk. “I think I’m quite recovered enough. Don’t you?”

“ _Fuck,_ Cassandra,” said Varric, and gulped. “I mean—yeah, you’re good, put me down. You’re going to stretch this collar.”

She did. Actually lowered him to the ground, didn’t drop him as she was half-tempted to do. “You never fasten the collar,” she pointed out, “so why does it matter?”

Varric made a production of straightening his clothes—really, she’d done nothing to his trousers—and grumbled something unintelligible.

Behind them, Cassandra heard a distinct whistle. She turned and unsurprisingly saw Bull, leaning against the outside of the Herald’s Rest, giving her a thumbs-up. She blushed despite herself and discreetly rolled her shoulder; her arm felt a bit sore from the sudden weight, but the joint hadn’t given her any trouble.

“I’m going to get you back for that,” Varric promised, red high on his cheeks. Cassandra blinked. She hadn’t genuinely meant to embarrass him, only to show off a little. It hadn’t occurred to her that she might actually spark some of their old, genuine antagonism. But the look Varric shot her out of the corner of his eye wasn’t angry—curious and uncertain.

“I would like to see you try,” she said, and was surprised to realize she meant it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't written for _Inquisition_ characters in for-fucking-ever, or played _Inquisition_ in for-fucking-ever, so apologies if this is not the best characterization. I'm having fun, anyway.
> 
> Comments and kudos are, as always, fantastic.


	2. Chapter 2

“I’m just saying, _Vidas_ sounds a lot like _Fenris._ ” Dorian leaned over the table and propped his chin on the rim of his tankard, too tipsy to care that he looked ridiculous.

Before they’d defeated Corypheus, Cassandra hadn’t spent much time in the Herald’s Rest. When she wasn’t in the field she was training, or keeping the inquisition running, or doing her research. Once the inquisitor dragged Cassandra and all the rest of the women in the inquisition’s inner circle to the Herald’s Rest for what she called girls’ night. In hindsight Adaar had just wanted an excuse to spend time with Sera, but Vivienne had been taken with the idea and had continued it ( _sans_ Adaar and Sera, after the first time they put a stink bomb under Josephine’s chair).

With Vivienne in Val Royeaux those nights had come to an end, but now Cassandra had so little to do she often visited the Herald’s Rest anyway. The day after she was cleared to train again she brought Varric’s latest draft with her. As he had predicted she hadn’t much time to look at it during the day, and he was finally getting deeper into the plot. Unfortunately Cassandra wasn’t allowed to read very far before she was interrupted.

Varric rolled his eyes. His jewelry flickered gold in the low light of the bar. She stared at it, and wondered what would happen if she pulled at his necklace. “Not my fault Tevinter names all sound the same. ‘Sides, where’d you get a look at my manuscript anyway?” He elbowed Cassandra, and she blinked. She’d been staring, hadn’t she? Hopefully no one had noticed. “Thought we had editor-client privilege, Seeker.”

In revenge she elbowed him lightly in the ear. Varric shoved her away and Cassandra swayed to the side—why had he pushed her so far? Her balance felt wrong and her head swam as she righted herself. How many glasses had she had, again? “I didn’t show him the story!”

Dorian snorted. “She just never shuts up about it.”

“And Dorian reads over her shoulder,” Bull added. “You gotta pay more attention to lines of sight, Cassandra.”

Cassandra sputtered. She played plenty of attention to lines of sight, thank you, but that was in battle—not Skyhold’s library _._ Saying this would probably set Bull or Varric off on some tale about a library-based ambush, though, so she took a drink instead. The Herald’s Rest had gotten some fig wine from Nevarra recently—shit, but it reminded her of home, Anthony letting her drink out of the bottle.

“ _But._ Back to the original topic,” Dorian insisted, holding up a hand. “Are you or are you not in love with Fenris? ‘Cause we’re your friends, comrades-in-arms, you can tell us.”

“Fine, you caught me. I’ve been pining desperately for that pretty-boy for years, Hawke and the Rivaini snatched him right out of my clutches and now all I can do is write friend-fiction.” Varric threw a piece of walnut shell at Dorian. It bounced off his nose and into the tankard. “What kind of hack do you think I am?”

Bull and Cassandra snorted simultaneously.

“Shut,” said Varric, “the fuck up.”

“What do you mean Hawke _and_ Isabela?” Cassandra asked, leaning forward. She couldn’t help it, she wanted to _know._ Varric had told her a lot of details but not this one. And Hawke hadn’t been forthcoming at all.

Varric opened his mouth—to explain or brush her off, who knew—but before he could get a word in Dorian pointed at him and snapped, “ _Monty._ She’s _both_ of them.”

Gods, she didn’t want to hear any more of this. Cassandra shoved at Dorian’s tankard. It skidded forward and his chin dropped into it, splashing ale onto the table. While he sputtered Cassandra blew a raspberry at him.

Varric  leaned forward, grinning like he knew Cassandra could see right down the front of his shirt. “Seeker, are you drunk?”

Cassandra planted her hand on his face and tried to shove him away, but Varric just laughed and batted her arm down. “I’m the Right Hand of the Divine!” Or. Probably. Vivienne hadn’t picked hers yet. “ _And_ a Seeker, and I do not get drunk.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I am a little tipsy, perhaps,” Cassandra admitted. Varric wasn’t, though, not even a little. Bastard. “Ugh. I’m going back to my rooms.” She directed this last to Bull and Dorian as she shoved herself to her feet. Her head swam at the sudden motion and she scowled.

“Drink some water,” Bull ordered, while Dorian only grumbled, still trying to wring ale out of his goatee.

As she pushed through the door Cassandra heard Varric add, “I should probably call it a night, too.”

Cassandra frowned. Did she want his company on the walk back to Skyhold or not?

The problem was—the problem was that Dorian had seen the similarities Cassandra had, only he hadn’t thought they were ridiculous. And the other problem was that Varric had agreed with him, and he was joking, but Varric was very good at turning serious things into a joke. And the _other_ other problem was that she shouldn’t care about any of that—why should she care if Varric were in love with Fenris, or Bianca, or Divine Flaming Victoria for that matter?

Shit. Blasphemy. Cassandra sent up a quick prayer to the Maker in recompense.

She was staring at the ground and so saw Varric’s shadow catching up to her before the man himself. She half-expected an opening sally but he stayed quiet, falling into step. It was easy for him. Cassandra realized she had been walking rather slowly, and frowned at her traitorous boots.

“At least Dorian isn’t saying anything about _us_ anymore,” she said, tongue too loose, gesturing vaguely between the two of them. If he had said something like that tonight—Cassandra rather suspected she would have done something regrettable, though she wasn’t sure what.

Varric raised an eyebrow and tucked his hands in his pockets. Without Bianca on his back he always looked incomplete. “Yeah. At least.”

* * *

Finally, _finally,_ something happened.

Cassandra was on the battlements over the gate when she saw a small, familiar figure run to them. It took her a moment to place the dwarf girl with her overlarge helmet at this distance. A few words drifted up from the gate: “Separated…don’t know…Storm Coast…Inquisitor?”

Rat, that was her name—the squire from that little mercenary band the Inquisitor had taken a shine to, and obviously in some distress. Cassandra hurried down from the gate.

Between great, exhausted breaths—how long had she been running?—Rat relayed her story again, and gave Cassandra a rough map of the Waking Sea. Apparently she had been separated from the rest of Sutherland’s company along the coast and they had failed to report. “Go rest,” Cassandra ordered, giving her a few coins; the girl deserved better than the barracks, after her last few trying days. “The inquisition will take care of this.”

By the afternoon Leliana had narrowed down their search to the Storm Coast, and Cassandra volunteered to conduct the search herself—with help, of course. Dorian hated the field but had begun to make noises about returning to Tevinter if his boredom didn’t abate; the Iron Bull had been letting Krem lead the Chargers for the last several missions. And Varric…well, perhaps he would enjoy a change of pace. She marched to his room last.

“Just the stab-happy Seeker I was hoping for,” Varric said, glancing up from his manuscript. “This is the last batch, Seeker—have fun.”

If she was too excited he would tease her, so Cassandra kept her face neutral. Although the story was all rather slapdash, she _did_ enjoy reading it. Varric’s barbs easier to tolerate when not directed at her. “I’ll try not to stab this one,” she said, leaning over his desk, “but I promise nothing if Monty dies.”

“Is that a joke? Seeker, were you _joking_?” Varric asked.

Cassandra shrugged.

Varric frowned as if considering pressing his luck, but thought the better of it. “Listen, I heard you’re getting an expedition together. Bianca might come in handy,” he wheedled.

Did he not think she would include him otherwise? Varric had joined the inquisition in the first place because Cassandra dragged him along. “Yes, she will. We leave in an hour, so get what you need and meet us at the stables.”

“Oh.” Not meeting an argument, Varric relaxed, seeming confused but pleased. “Alright, see you there then. And, uh—don’t let Dorian read these over your shoulder.”

Cassandra accepted the sheaf of paper; he’d even gone and bound it, adding a cover sheet. “I won’t,” she assured him. Now she knew to stay vigilant. Also—judging by Varric’s other romance serials, she could expect a love scene in these last few chapters. Cassandra certainly didn’t plan to read _that_ in public. “One hour,” she reminded Varric as she strode from his room, and flipped open the cover page.

* * *

"Dwarven courtships started with gifts. Surfacers hauled the tradition from Orzammar and it still flourished among the deshyrs and coterie alike. Every house loved to prove they had money to throw around.

Thaun was flat broke and whatever he and Vidas had definitely wasn’t courtship, but he wanted to buy the elf something anyway. Something that couldn’t just be brushed off as part of Vidas’s employment. Thaun could think of a hundred things Vidas could use: a decent meal, a soft inn bed, maybe a bath. But they had Monty’s money for that kind of thing, and anyway if Thaun bought Vidas a nice inn room he’d be sharing; he was tired of roughing it.

_[transition shit, move this whole scene to a market maybe]_

Deep, honey-gold lilies perched in a vase near the front of the market stall, the exact shade of Vidas’s eyes. _(too much? shitty description? ugh)_

Monty looked back curiously. Thaun snorted at his own stupidity and hurried to catch up."

* * *

It was impossible to read on a horse. Cassandra knew this, but as she was mid-chapter when they set off on the journey, she had to make an attempt anyway. For fifteen minutes she tried to stop bouncing long enough to read the words on the page, but the attempt just made her sick to her stomach. She made a disgusted noise and put the manuscript away. It would have to wait until the next time they camped.

Still, if she couldn’t read she may as well ask about something that had been nagging at her. “Varric,” she said to get his attention, since he was currently glaring at his horse.

“Hmm? What?” His hands were white-knuckled on the reins, though he relaxed a fraction when he realized she’d spoken to him. “Problem already, Seeker?”

He badly needed to ease up on the reins, but Cassandra could worry about that later. Years of Inquisition expeditions had not been sufficient to teach Varric to ride well. No matter how much advice she gave him, Varric was probably just destined to be a bad rider. “Why do you so dislike traditional aspects of romance?”

Varric’s head tilted in confusion. “I…don’t? They’re not my favorite things to read, but it’s not like I don’t enjoy romances in general—”

“I don’t mean romance serials themselves.” Cassandra shook her head and started to list off the books on her fingers. “The Knight-Captain turns down a good meal with the guard-captain because she would rather eat in her usual tavern, Brennokovic buys his lover jewelry but the lover persuades him to sell it for bail, now this business with Thaun and the flowers. Did you know, five of your protagonists specifically say they don’t see the point of buying a loved one flowers? You even gave that line to Hawke in _The Tale of the Champion._ ”

“To be fair,” said Varric, “Hawke really was terrible at buying gifts. I told you about that Rivaini fertility pendant, right?”

At that Bull turned back in his saddle, grinning. His horse made a noise of protest at his shifting bulk. “Hawke found _what_?”

Varric clasped his hands together in imitation of the pendant and, well, something else. Bull guffawed. “Isabela still keeps it in her sock drawer.”

Cassandra bit at her lip to keep from smiling. She shouldn’t be laughing at dirty gestures—it was unbecoming for someone so highly placed in the chantry. Also, none of the rest would ever let it go. “That is not the point.”

“I dunno what to tell you, Seeker. I tend to write the more practical types, you know? They don’t care about stuff like that.” Varric snorted and added, more quietly, “Bianca used to hate it.”

Despite herself, Cassandra straightened to attention. Varric rarely spoke of Bianca without prompting, and even that had to be done by Hawke or Cole, someone he cared about. “Oh?”

“The one and only time I bought her jewelry, she laughed in my face.” Varric chuckled. “I stuck to scrap metal after that.”

Well, no wonder he was like this, Cassandra almost said, but managed to stop herself. She hesitated and ran the words over in her head before the spoke them. It had been a while since they’d had a real argument; she didn’t want to start one now. “Even practical people can enjoy a little romance,” she said stiffly. The book, right, they were talking about a book. “I think you know that—Thaun giving Vidas his good-luck charm was romantic. But stereotypical things, flowers, jewelry, nights on the town, they have their place as well. As long as it means something to the other person.”

By the end of her little speech Cassandra felt red-faced; she stared straight down at her hands on the reins, because she could feel Varric’s eyes on her and she just _knew_ Bull was smirking.

“I’ll say,” Dorian finally said, voice haughty enough that Cassandra was sure he was joking. “Amatus, did you hear that? Cassandra agrees you should take me somewhere nice. Perhaps somewhere not in stinking Ferelden.”

“Sure, as long as you don’t mind bringing the Chargers,” said Bull.

Then Dorian’s horse saw a snake on the road and decided to panic, which thankfully distracted all of them.

* * *

Once they reached the Storm Coast, finding Sutherland’s band was only a matter of following the battle cries. Cassandra scouted ahead and saw Darkspawn, lots of them, pursuing the obviously exhausted company. She signaled to the rest of the party and ran into the fray.

Before joining the inquisition Cassandra hadn’t seen many darkspawn. It had only taken one fight for her to get thoroughly sick of the things, and a few more to realize they were all just…really stupid. Not to mention their armor was half-rotted, no care taken at all. If it weren’t for their numbers and the taint they’d never be a threat. She threw herself into the battle, comfortable there as she had been on the road.

“How many have you got, C— _oof_.”

Oh, fuck.

Cassandra felled the genlock in front of her and turned back. Varric was higher up on an outcropping of rock; he _should_ have been out of the way of the battle, only one genlock had gone out of its way. Blood soaked dark down his arm, and the genlock’s sword was raised again—

 _Oh no,_ she thought, stomach sinking, _not him,_ and took half a step back.

And then the genlock’s head exploded. Bianca’s bolt sailed off into the melee.

“Cassandra! To your left!” Bull snapped, and Cassandra jerked to attention in time to dodge an Emmisarry’s spell.

It felt like hours before the last darkspawn fell, her heartbeats stretching out into minutes, and finally Cassandra tugged her blade from a cooling corpse. The company was all alive and so was the rest of her party; there was nothing stopping her from turning back to Varric.

He had already pulled the remains of his ruined sleeve off the coat and was poking at the wound. Cassandra wiped her sword on her trousers and jogged the few steps to him. “Let me,” she panted, out of breath from the fight, already dropping to one knee. Cassandra had never been much good at field medicine. She was better at combat and strategy; she knew enough anatomy to aim her blows, could tie a bandage or drink a potion. But though the blade had bit deep and messy, jagged edges of the hurlock’s sword hooking through his muscle, and Varric made a noise of protest when she examined it. But Cassandra saw only red. “I don’t think it’s tainted,” she said finally, “but you should have someone look at it.”

“Yeah,” said Varric. He grinned down at her; it looked odd from this angle. For once she was lower than him. “I was trying to, but this nosy Seeker—”

Cassandra’s face turned warm. “Shut up.” What had she even been thinking? Her eyes skittered from Varric’s face to his chest and she blushed harder before focusing on the wound again. His blood had streaked over her hand and she pulled it back, staring at the lines of red on her palm. She didn’t act like this when Bull was injured, or even the inquisitor.

“Hey,” Varric began. Something in his tone made Cassandra jerk to attention. But then his eyes focused on something past her, and footsteps crunched over the grass.

She turned to see Sutherland, obviously exhausted but not too much worse for wear. “We’ve gone through all the potions—ours and yours,” he said with a sheepish smile, “but I can patch you up, if you like. Should keep you together on the trip back to Skyhold.”

Cassandra rose awkwardly to her feet as Sutherland led them from the battle. His company had made a makeshift camp nearby before they were attacked. Shayd and Voth had already dragged themselves there; they had the drained, stretched-thin look of people who had drunk too many potions in succession. Dorian and Bull had taken up spots on the other side of the firepit. Bull was leaning back on his elbows, making quiet conversation with the other two members of the company, while Dorian hunched over the fire.

Cassandra fished a pack of basic medical supplies from her saddlebags and offered it to Sutherland. He’d gotten Varric to sit on a ridge of stone on the edge of the camp, where the ground began to rise up into one of the coast’s hills; it kept the wound at his eye level. “I’m glad you are all safe.” She scuffed the toe of her boot against the ground. If she made conversation, it wouldn’t seem odd to stay here instead of joining the others. “Rat was worried.”

Sutherland nodded, looking altogether too cheerful, considering. “I’m glad she made it back too! We didn’t realize she’d been separated ‘til after the darkspawn were dead, we were worried about the worst. Ah, here we are.” He pulled a large hooked needle and thin thread from the pack.

“Shit, really?” Varric grumbled, and scrunched up his nose.

Really, Cassandra should head back to camp. She glanced over and saw Dorian had gotten the fire going, and Bull had pulled out their rations; a few words drifted their way, but between the crackling fire and the ocean in the distance it was impossible to make out a conversation. Sutherland, meanwhile, was going on about the importance of stitching a wound closed and how Varric absolutely could not “just slap on a bandage and call it a day.”

Varric’s cut-off boast, the genlock towering over him. Adrenaline still pounded useless in her veins. Varric had saved himself, but if he hadn’t, Cassandra wouldn’t have been able to reach him in time. She had known that even as she started to run.

Who cared about how it looked? Cassandra might in a few hours, but for now she couldn’t bring herself to. She plopped down on the grass Varric’s side, opposite Sutherland, and looped her arms around her knees. Varric gave her a curious look but then swore as Sutherland began stitching. It was odd. Cassandra liked silence, but sitting by Varric, wanting to talk but neither of them doing so—it was strange. She stared at the dark stains on the knees of her trousers.

Suddenly Varric leaned back, uninjured arm outstretched, and Cassandra jolted to attention. “You shouldn’t—” she began, scowling.

But he only plucked something from the ground. A small blue and white flower; they dotted the whole the coast, as common as the grass. Varric carefully broke the stem and leaned back upright. “Sorry, serrah,” he told Sutherland, not sounding sorry at all; and then he held the flower up under Cassandra’s nose.

“What?” she stammered.

“It’s a flower, Seeker. I got it on good authority that even killjoys like these things,” he said.

“That’s not what I said,” Cassandra protested, but snatched it from his fingers.

He was giving her a _flower._ She stared at the tiny petals for a moment. Her mouth was hanging open and she clamped it shut, lips pulling into a grin before she could put a stop to it.

“If you think it’s stupid—”

“Shut up.” Cassandra tucked the flower behind her ear and very carefully wove the stem into her braid. “Thank you.” He hadn’t laughed at her. He’d _paid attention._

Varric eyed her like he was waiting for a catch. “Wel— _fuck,_ Sutherland,” he managed, free hand twisting in the fabric of his trousers. Very carefully, Cassandra rested her hand over his. There was still blood under her nails and dried in the lines of her palms, but Varric didn’t protest; he flipped his over and twined their fingers together, tensing again at the bite of Sutherland’s needle. “I’m not hallucinating, right? I didn’t loose _that_ much blood.”

“Not unless I am as well,” Cassandra managed. She did know what he meant. Considering their past acquaintance, it all seemed a little unbelievable. He still made fun of her behaviour when she’d taken him prisoner. Some of the sting had gone out of it, sure, but still.

“You aren’t,” Sutherland said, the words garbled like he was holding back laughter.

Cassandra blushed. She wanted to add more, something along the lines of _you know I haven’t done anything like this in a long time,_ but Sutherland was right there. And Cassandra was definitely not having this sort of conversation near witnesses. “Thank you, serrah,” she said dryly, and leaned back against the slope of the hill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading and sorry about the wait! i promise the last chapter won't take as long. this was just meant to be a two-parter but I had a good bit written and wanted to post, so sorry if this feels incomplete.


	3. Chapter 3

The first thought Cassandra had after she threw the manuscript on the ground was, _Oh no, Varric’s been in love with Fenris this whole time and I’m going to kill him._

Her second thought was, _Don’t be stupid. He obviously cares for me, and he doesn’t lie about things like that—he wouldn’t, because he knows I would throw him off Skyhold’s battlements. And living is very important to Varric._

Her third was, _Thick rods? Really?_

Cassandra scrubbed her hand over her face. Her eyes were itching from squinting at Varric’s cramped handwriting in the firelight; her body was sore and slow from days of riding and then the earlier fight. But her mind had refused to calm down, so here she was, reading too late by the fire. She’d known she would regret it in the morning. She just hadn’t realized how much. She’d read some of Varric’s smut scenes before, of course, but it all felt so much more _uncomfortable_ now.

Not least because he left a lot to be desired in the first draft. Hopefully the real thing would be a little less awkward, Cassandra thought, and made herself blush.

The pages were damp where they’d lain on the grass. Cassandra picked up the manuscript and blotted it with her sleeve. At least the ink hadn’t run too badly; she could still read the words. Perhaps Varric wouldn’t complain too much later. He’d grumbled for ten minutes last week because she accidentally got jam on one page.

She skimmed over the scene, biting at her lower lip, and tried to focus on the words while her mind kept wandering. On some level—the most rational one—Cassandra knew she was being ridiculous. The flower Varric had given her was still in her hair, even though Dorian had snickered and Bull had grinned knowingly enough that she’d almost pulled it out. (Almost.) He’d let her hold his hand. Maker’s sake. It was all too simple to be meaningless. Varric cared about her; he’d be putting on a better show if he didn’t.

But Cassandra wasn’t as rational as she liked to be. They had been at odds for a long time, and the couple in his serial had a _lot_ of similarities to his own life. At first laughing it off had been easy, but the more the plot went on…Varric wasn’t putting much effort into this story, he’d said it himself. Wasn’t it possible he was drawing from real life? No matter how stupid it would sound out loud, she knew she needed a definitive _no_ before she stopped worrying.

She glanced over at Varric’s bedroll. He’d turned on his side to keep weight off his injured arm, and the bandages seemed to glow white in the firelight. Rubbing her eyes again, Cassandra set the manuscript aside and returned to her own bedroll. Staying up all night wouldn’t help anything, she decided. She could worry about her personal business in the morning.

* * *

The problem with worrying about it in the morning was that in the morning, Cassandra remembered she was traveling with three mercenaries she didn’t know and a couple of gossips. She was glad she and Varric had gotten _somewhere,_ but she could have done without Dorian and Bull witnessing it. At least they were all too tired for teasing. Cassandra woke up exhausted and ready to bite someone’s head off if they spoke to her more than was absolutely necessary, and everyone in their little band knew it.

But the lack of privacy meant that she couldn’t talk to Varric about anything important, either. They didn’t avoid each other over the day’s journey, but they didn’t seek each other out either. Honestly, Cassandra was grateful. And surprised, though she shouldn’t be. Varric kept his feelings  private; she should have expected them to be in accord in this.

They reached Skyhold near the end of the day to find it buzzing like an overturned wasp nest. The reason for that quickly became clear: the inquisitor had returned at last. Cassandra had never resented the woman more. Varric and Sutherland’s company were whisked off to the healers, while Cassandra made her way to the war room, scowling so fiercely that Leliana leaned over to ask whether she was all right.

Some hours later, the inquisitor finished explaining what had happened in the deep roads and what her plans were now, and Cassandra had a headache. The sun had completely set. Well, she thought as she made her way to her quarters, there went her plans for talking to Varric; he was probably asleep by now.

Just as she resigned herself to deciding where they stood in the morning, she turned the corner and saw Varric waiting outside her door. “Took you long enough,” he said with an awkward wave. “I figured we should talk.”

She let out a long, relieved breath, and felt herself relax. “I agree,” she said, and pushed open her door. “Come in?”

Cassandra kicked the door shut behind them and tried not to feel self-conscious as Varric looked around her chambers. At least she hadn’t left anything too embarrassing lying out. Sure, she trusted Varric, but she wasn’t quite ready to discuss her Antivan poetry collections. “So…” she began, “you are sure you aren’t in love with Fenris?”

Varric let out a startled cackle, and then glanced back at her. “Wait. You’re serious.”

In that moment she knew that no matter how long their relationship lasted, Varric was _never_ going to let this go. “…Perhaps a little,” Cassandra admitted.

“See, this,” Varric said with a sigh, “this is why I don’t write dwarf protagonists anymore. Gives everyone the wrong idea.”

“But it’s not just that! Vidas is an escaped elf slave from Tevinter, he wields a large sword—”

Varric raised his eyebrows, defensive smirk plastered on his face. “Seeker, plenty of elves have big swords.”

A grin pulled at Cassandra’s lips without her permission, and she scowled extra hard to make up for it. “You called Fenris pretty at least five times in _The Tale of the Champion,”_ she reminded him. Not to mention his descriptions when he told her Hawke’s story, but Cassandra didn’t have written evidence for those.

“Of course I did. If you met him, you’d get it—nothing personal.” Varric leaned back against the bookshelf. “Andraste’s ass, Seeker, do you _want_ me to be in love with Fenris?”

“Clearly not, or you wouldn’t be in here,” Cassandra said. Her frankness took Varric by surprise, and she took advantage of his startled silence. “Varric, I know this isn’t the most…rational concern. But nothing about this seems rational to me. I suppose I’m…” Looking for excuses, she almost said. Reasons why they couldn’t work. Cassandra didn’t want him to take it the wrong way, but he seemed to understand anyway; his shoulders relaxed.

“I don’t write myself into my fiction, believe it or not,” Varric said, voice dry but not snapping anymore. “And I don’t write my friends into my fiction, either. Sure, I get inspiration from real life, because everyone I meet has something batshit going on. But it’s just inspiration. It’s not one-to-one.”

“Good,” said Cassandra. And now she just felt silly, which was perfect. Somehow when she pictured this conversation it hadn’t been nearly as awkward, though she wasn’t sure how.

Varric shot her a sidelong look and then turned back to her bookshelf, eyes skimming over the spines. “Well, I guess I’m not being _entirely_ truthful.”

“Really? You?”

Varric made a rude gesture, but Cassandra only grinned. When they’d first met she hadn’t understood why he enjoyed annoying her so much; now she saw the appeal. “I did write myself into a novel once—ah, here we go.” He pulled _Swords & Shields II _down from a shelf just higher than his head. She nearly offered to help but knew he’d only take offense.

What could he mean? Cassandra rifled through the _Swords & Shields _characters in her head, but none of them fit Varric at all. “Who—” she began, but he had already stopped on one page near the middle.

“There we go.” His fingers rested on a line, and when she met his eyes, frowning in confusion, he quickly looked away. He’d opened to a paragraph describing the crowd in a local tavern. Cassandra must have skimmed the paragraph a dozen times, but she’d never paid much attention to it.

Certainly not enough to take notice of one particular sentence. _In the corner near the bar, a dwarf with a broken nose tried to make a beautiful scarred woman smile._

He’d written this ages ago. Before the Winter Palace, before that mess with Bianca, even. They hadn’t even truly been friends at the time.

“Not my most inspired bit of writing—”

He was _not_ going to insult that in _her_ presence. “Varric,” Cassandra snapped, and he shut up. She carefully placed the book aside. Then she grabbed him around the waist and lifted him to sit on top of her desk.

“What—Cassan—” Varric began, and then she kissed him. He didn’t protest _that._ Actually he grabbed the back of her neck, pulling her closer, and she was quite happy to oblige. For such a smooth talker he was clumsier than she expected, but it wasn’t as if either of them had done this recently. She leaned down further, one of her hands landing on Varric’s leg and the other on the desk.

The creak of her hinges was all the warning they got before the inquisitor walked in. “Cassandra, dear, I meant to ask—oh!”

Cassandra liked the inquisitor, she really did, but this was ridiculous.

“Hey,” Varric managed. He looked like he’d been hit over the head, except he was smiling.

Well, if _he_ wasn’t going to complain, Cassandra would. “Do you _mind_?” she asked, so vehement she made _herself_ wince.

But the inquisitor only said, “Not at all,” stepped out, and shut the door. Then she opened it again, sticking her head through the door way so fast her horns clacked against it. “Congratulations, by the way—it’s about time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the thing about writing cassandra is that she knows what she wants and isn't afraid to go after it, which really puts a damper on my dumb fanfiction drama plots. :) I wrote this fic after reading one too many where varric's stuff was directly analogous to his real-life relationships. to be fair there is some of that in canon, but as someone who is...yanno...a writer, the real writing process is a lot more complicated than that! so this was an excuse for me to get meta about the writing process, while having fun with one of my old favorite ships along the way. even though it was kinda stupid, I hope you had as much fun reading as I had writing it.
> 
> as always: comments and kudos are great; you can find me on tumblr and pillowfort @coraxes and on twitter @annuxgen. I do not talk about dragon age very much, but I'm always happy to go on about cassandra and varric! (or hawke, or isabela, or alistair, or morrigan, or...)


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